This invention relates to fuel-feed systems for engines, gas turbines, burners and the like, including a fuel pressure source communicated with a fuel tank and a means for maintaining the working properties of fuel.
The latter means in known such systems (Charles Fayette Taylor, The Internal Combustion Engine in Theory and Practice, The MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass, 1966; K. Abrosimov, A. Bromberg, F. Katayev, Road-Making Machinery, Mir Publishers, Moscow, 1972; M Khovakh, Motor-Vehicle Engines, Mir Publishers, Moscow, 1971; B. Gelman and M. Moskvin, Farm Tractors, Mir Publishers, Moscow, 1975; U.S. Pat. No. 3,441,871, etc.) removes solid contaminants from fuel by filtering, straining, gravitational displacement, centrifugal separation, etc. with full flow and bypass (5-20% of the flow).
Especially rigid requirements to filtration are for fuel-injection engines and gas turbines. Of the latters, the problem particularly arises in road-vehicle gas turbines because the parts of their fuel-feed systems are many times smaller (in comparison with those of aircraft) with openings susceptible to blockage through dirt ingress and carbon deposit formation.
Being unable to remove all solid contaminants from fuel, said known solids-removing means are assumed to be qualified if the size of the removed solids is more than the clearance in sliding pairs or openings. In many cases this is achieved by fine-mesh bypass filters consuming much energy and requiring their frequent changes because of their clogging and, in some areas, becoming a repository for biological growth.